Abstract
This chapter discusses prior research about media coverage of women athletes in general, as well as lesbian athletes, and analyzes of the coming out stories of prominent athletes. Scholars have uniformly found that women’s sports receive little coverage, whereas the subject of lesbianism in women’s sports is routinely ignored or presented as a problem. But, recent studies of coming out stories have found reporting to be strongly favorable, suggesting a more hospitable societal and media environment for gay and lesbian athletes.
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Cassidy, W.P. (2019). Media Coverage of Lesbian Athletes. In: Sports Journalism and Women Athletes. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-30526-0_2
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